I just learned that Jimmy Swaggart died earlier this month. He was a terrible human being, a televangelist, an occupation that is an automatic red flag for a sleazy parasite, without question. I dare you to name a single televangelist who isn’t a con artist, and Swaggart was one of the early members of that ilk who did a marvelous job of representing the poison of organized religion. He’s best known for this performance:
He was weeping crocodile tears because he’d been exposed. He’d defamed a fellow Assemblies of God minister, Marvin Gorman, who was a competitor for the leadership of the denomination, and in revenge, Gorman staked out a motel that everyone knew was where Swaggart met with prostitutes, and caught him in the act. It was a sordid and surprisingly typical episode in the life of this slimeball. A few years later he was caught with another prostitute, but it didn’t matter because he’d founded his own independent ministry.
He died, a still popular televangelist, and was even inducted into the Southern Gospel Music Hall of Fame. The wicked always win in Christianity.
It may not seem related, but it is — this morning I watched the latest video from Mikey Neumann, about the movie The Kingdom of Heaven. I’ve never seen it, because I knew enough of the history of the Crusades to know it was an even more wicked series of examples of Christian hypocrisy, exploitation, and murder that resonates today with all the horror going on in Gaza, Iran, Syria, and Israel. This kind of behavior is characteristic of organized religion, do I really need to watch a whole long movie that illustrates it?
Maybe I should. Neumann brings a humanist/agnostic perspective to his review that makes me think I might just like the movie very much. It seems to affirm my negative opinion of religion, and emphasizes the value of human life — against the background of some of the most bloody, venal, and pointless historical events of the Middle Ages.
Have any of my readers seen the movie? This is your chance to chastise me for not seeing it, or congratulate me on avoiding a 3 hour slog. I’m tempted to correct my ignorance by streaming the movie.
Do I need to make the connection between a horrible series of wars and the petty life of Jimmy Swaggart more explicit? This is a Christian fantasy still thriving, that we need to encourage more death and destruction in the Middle East for the glory of God.
Great film. Ridley Scott, so you know it will at least look good. And some fine actors. Definitely recommend.
On the topic of Crusades, you may well enjoy On Crusades, or, how not to identify with losers, in which the esteemed Dr Eleanor Janega argues that the unifying principle which brings together the surprisingly wide assortment of things we lump in under the banner of “the Crusades” is that “every single one of these Crusades were fought by a baffling assortment of losers who were totally ineffectual.”
Her blog is a treasure.
For more information about this vile creature, see link below.
“Scathing Atheist 646 Gone with the Sinned Edition”
.https://youtube.com/watch?v=fnmg1xgp6DI
Good movie. But as with all Ridley Scott movies, don’t expect it to actually be historical in the slightest, no matter how much he claims it is.
My recommendation for all these sleazy xtian terrorists is:
Grab your AR-15, your bible, put on your maga hat, wrap yourself in the flag and CRAWL OFF AND DIE.
I hesitate to recommend this movie, because it’s long and rather unpleasant, and short on sympathetic characters. There’s Tiberias (Jeremy Irons) who’s at least wise enough to say “fuck all this” and give up a losing battle. There’s Balian of Ibelin (Orlando Bloom), whose pre-final-battle-for-Jerusalem speech pretty much sums up the reality of the Middle East — “All have claim, none have claim!” And then there’s Salah ul-Din (Ghassan Massoud), who actually comes off as the good guy here.
If you don’t want to watch the whole thing, just start with the part where Balian is organizing the defense of Jerusalem in anticipation of Saladin’s imminent attack and siege. (I love a good battle scene.)
I’m fast coming to the conclusion that anyone stupid enough to donate to these ministries deserves to be parted from their money. If you want to donate to religion, find a soup kitchen. Or a food pantry. Or a homeless shelter. Yes, they make people sit through a sermon before helping them out but at least they are helping people out.
tl:dw
People have to make decisions with incomplete information all the time. To me, this review is too much time and effort to get the information make that decision.
I don’t think anyone here is surprised by the syllogism between Crusades and this guy. You are stuck at home. Watch it if you like, because boredom. :) It’s a thing. You can tell us just how bad that fart smelled or how burnt that cookie was. I’ll take your word for it.
I loved the link in #2 @ Dunc. I don’t know as much about the subject from my liberal arts education as the blogger there, but based on what I do know? Accurate!
It’s a great movie. Beautiful with wonderful music that is kind of period. Not real historical but that’s usually necessary. Almost all the people in it are cynical about organized religion. The fanatics are well-cast. Impressive battle scenes. Opulent court scenes. Always nice to have a leper getting a major part. Must watched it a hundred times by now. Epics are too short.
Regarding “every single one of these Crusades were fought by a baffling assortment of losers who were totally ineffectual.”, I very much doubted that claim. So I took a quick check.
My query: did the european crusades against the baltics result in chrstianisation ? Summarise
The Bubblebot: Yes, the European crusades against the Baltic region—known as the Northern Crusades—did result in widespread Christianisation, though the process was complex and often coercive.
🛡️ Summary of Outcomes
Primary Goal: Convert pagan Baltic, Finnic, and Slavic tribes to Christianity.
Key Players: Catholic monarchies (Denmark, Sweden, Poland), military orders (Teutonic Knights, Livonian Sword Brothers), and the Papacy.
Timeline: 12th to 15th centuries.
Regions Targeted: Modern-day Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Finland, and parts of Poland and Russia.
⚔️ Methods and Impact
Military Campaigns: Crusades were sanctioned by the Pope and often brutal, involving forced baptisms and suppression of local religions.
Teutonic Order: Established a militarized theocracy in Prussia, aggressively expanding and converting local populations.
Cultural Transformation: Paganism was largely eradicated; churches, monasteries, and German settlements reshaped the region.
Lithuania: Resisted conversion until 1386, when Grand Duke Jogaila accepted baptism and united with Poland, formalizing Christianisation.
🧭 Legacy
Religious Shift: The Baltic became predominantly Roman Catholic.
Political Realignment: Crusades facilitated territorial expansion and Germanization.
Controversy: The campaigns blurred lines between religious mission and imperial conquest, often criticized as ethnic cleansing under a religious guise.
John Morales – I think the relevance of your post depends very heavily on the meaning of “these”. I personally understand it was the crusades to the “Holy Land” that were being discussed here. I had never heard of the Northern Crusades.
Jim, I checked before commenting. She is self-declaredly “not really ambiguous”.
Relevant excerpt, my added emphasis:
“When we use the term ‘Crusade’ most people are going to think about Europeans venturing to the Holy Land, and that’s fair enough because that’s exactly what the first Crusade was. But there are so so many Crusades to look at across the medieval period. You can choose the first, second, third, fourth, fifth, and sixth crusades to the Levant or Asia Minor, obviously. But also there’s the Albigensian Crusade against the various good men and women in Languedoc.[1] Or how about the Crusades against the non-Christians in the Baltic region, prosecuted more specifically by the Teutonic Order, who were invented just for this purpose?[2] As a Bohemia specialist, I, of course, spend a bunch of time thinking about the Crusades called against the Hussites.[3]
That’s so many Crusades to think about, against so many groups of people, and across centuries on centuries. So when we say ‘Crusades’ is there any way to really think about any of these groups as a contiguous whole? I would say yes, because pretty uniformly every single one of these Crusades were fought by a baffling assortment of losers who were totally ineffectual.
What do I mean by that? Well, exactly what I said, thanks. It’s not really ambiguous.
But for some reason people have largely managed to ignore the fact that all of these Crusades were absolute miserable flops that didn’t manage to do a whole lot more than get a bunch of random people killed.”
To be fair, I concede that my comment depends heavily on the meaning of “ineffectual”, Jim.
They did change the course of history there, so it surely had an effect.
Regarding the crusades, while the those to the holy land were a complete failure in the long run, the northern crusades did succeed in spreading Christianity (quite brutally) in parts of the Baltic. The most successful crusades were the various wars of the so-called reconquista, which drove the muslims out of modern day Spain and Portugal. I’m not sure if those wars were official church-approved crusades or not, but they were fought in the same spirit.
*Not to be confused with moral or ethical
The institution of religion is the longest running conspiracy theory in human culture.
@12. John Morales : “I would say yes, because pretty uniformly every single one of these Crusades were fought by a baffling assortment of losers who were totally ineffectual.”
Emphasis added.
If that’s the exact quote then I’d say the qualifier of “pretty” in context allows for the exceptional exceptyion to the general rule and thus the statement remains true even if some rare crusade did kinda suceed in its goals because most did not. Maybe?
StevoR, it’s an oxymoron, unless the putative unifying trait is ineffectiveness.
So, no. No maybe. A bit like like saying “very unique” — either it’s unique, or there are other cases.
But hey, sure.
If she meant that, other than the cases where they were not totally ineffectual, they were effecutal.
Which specific cases had zero effect, of course, is left to your imagination.
I quote, again!:
What do I mean by that? Well, exactly what I said, thanks. It’s not really ambiguous.
Not like the claim lacks specificity: “uniformly every single one of these Crusades [blah]” is the set, which literally and explicitly excludes any possibility of exceptions. Even one exception would vitiate that claim, no? One single one.
Again:
“But for some reason people have largely managed to ignore the fact that all of these Crusades were absolute miserable flops that didn’t manage to do a whole lot more than get a bunch of random people killed.”
—
Your quibble is specious.
@ ^ John Morales : I don’t think so. Its pointing out that the vast majority of a set category have a particular trait or character witha qualifier allowing a small number of exceptions. Prwetty much all X are Y.= most X are Y – not absolutley every case but the majority.
Eg. Pretty much all sharks are carnivorourous with a very small number of exceptions eg Basking Shark, Whale Shark Bonnethead* shark.
.* See : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonnethead which eats plants too.
“Its pointing out that the vast majority of a set category have a particular trait or character witha qualifier allowing a small number of exceptions.”
Again:
“But for some reason people have largely managed to ignore the fact that all of these Crusades were absolute miserable flops that didn’t manage to do a whole lot more than get a bunch of random people killed.”
That is a direct quotation!
[all of these Crusades] ≠ [the vast majority of a set category]
but
[uniformly every single one of these Crusades] = [all of these Crusades]
—
Again, she fucking wrote: “What do I mean by that? Well, exactly what I said, thanks. It’s not really ambiguous.”
(Except to such as you, StevoR — those for whom the vast majority is every single one, so that it is ambigous, really)
Kingdom of Heaven is a really good movie. Not quite accurate historically, but still does a good job.
Make absolutely sure you watch the Director’s Cut! The original theatrical movie is a complete mess, the Director’s cut is a much better movie.